Investors will no longer be stuck over a wrong bank account number when claiming their savings certificate profits or principal. The risk of money going into the wrong account will also fall. The National Savings Scheme’s online management system has launched an automated Account Verification System (AVS) to check bank accounts. Bangladesh Bank and the relevant scheduled banks are putting it into effect from Tuesday.
A customer’s bank account, given at the time of buying a savings certificate or bond, can now be verified instantly. The system is being introduced under the Strengthening Public Financial Management Program to Enable Service Delivery (SPFMS), implemented by the finance division of the finance ministry.
Transactions for nine of the government’s 11 national savings schemes are already automatically handled through the National Savings Scheme Online Management System, or the NSC system. The National Savings Directorate says the launch of AVS will bring the rate of incorrect bank account entries down to near zero, reduce the risk of returned electronic fund transfers (EFTs), ease the hassle for investors, and cut extra work for the relevant offices. It will also make it easier to send a customer’s due money securely and accurately to the correct account holder.
The NSC system currently has 3,946,224 registered individual customers. On average, about 175,000 electronic fund transfers are made daily to pay out profits and principal, alongside roughly 8,000 new savings certificates issued each day.
Verification of a customer’s national ID and mobile number was already in place. Bank account verification has now been added to that. Previously, the online system had no way to automatically verify a bank account — whatever account number an applicant gave was entered into the system exactly as provided. If any digit was wrong, the profit or principal sent via EFT would bounce back, requiring the information to be corrected before the money could be resent. This added to investors’ hassle and increased the workload for issuing offices, the National Savings Directorate and related departments, while also carrying the risk of one person’s due money going into someone else’s account.
Under the new system, as soon as a bank account number is entered into the NSC system, it will be verified through Bangladesh Bank’s IT infrastructure and the relevant scheduled bank. First, the system will check whether the account number is correct and active. It will then match the account holder’s information against their national ID or passport number to confirm identity, catching any error or mismatch before the transaction goes through.
AVS will be used in two situations: when a new savings certificate or bond is purchased, and when an investor later wants to change or correct their bank account, with the new account similarly verified instantly.
The finance division says AVS is an important step in modernising the National Savings Scheme’s digital services. The technology-driven system, linked with Bangladesh Bank, will make savings certificate transactions safer, more transparent and more reliable. The division expects the system to reduce errors across the large volume of daily transactions and ensure customers’ due money reaches the correct designated bank account quickly and securely.